Father-of-eight is top volunteer for Chernobyl work

A father-of-eight has scooped the top prize at this year’s Volunteer Ireland Awards for his work with a Chernobyl children’s charity.

Kilkenny man Jim Kavanagh was named the Christine Buckley Volunteer-of-the-Year 2014 at an awards ceremony last night.

Over the past 20 years, Jim has helped raise more than €1.2m to help children and adults in Belarus, and brought 1,000 children to Ireland for rest and recuperation. He has helped thousands more in Belarus and Western Russia by making the 6,000-mile round-trip to the former over 20 times, delivering medical supplies, nappies, building materials and wheelchairs.

Jim set up the Volunteer Outreach Group of Adi Roche’s Chernobyl Children International (CCI) in Kilkenny in the 1990s and was nominated for the award by the charity’s CEO Adi Roche.

“The scale of what Jim has achieved and accomplished is truly great,” said Ms Roche.

“We at CCI have witnessed many people who have demonstrated the true meaning of volunteerism and we are delighted to say Jim is one of those stand-out special people.”

Also recognised was 10-year-old volunteer Quaid Cleland, the youngest ever winner of an award. For the past four years, Quaid has been working to increase awareness of deafness and promote the use of sign language in Ireland.

This year, Quaid ran a 12-month campaign to ‘Get Ireland Signing’ and called on RTÉ to use sign language on this year’s Late Late Toy Show. Last week, he realised his goal and, live on air, he showed Ryan Tubridy how to sign “happy Christmas everyone”.

Speaking at the awards ceremony, Volunteer Ireland CEO Nina Arwitz revealed that the ages of those short-listed ranged from 10 to 93.

“You are never too young or too old to make a difference through volunteering,” she said.

“Volunteer Ireland received 500 nominations for this year’s awards and I would like to extend my heartfelt thanks to every volunteer nominated for actively making a difference in their community.”